To me, this movie is perfection.

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

I didn't realize this was based on a true story (even though part of the opening narration hints at it), until I came to the review board here on IMDb. Apparently the film takes some liberties with the actual historical facts (don't they all?), but for the most part, the main story of two man-eating lions killing for pleasure in the Tsavo region of Kenya is fairly accurate. Depending on one's sources, those infamous man-eaters claimed the lives of anywhere between twenty eight and a hundred thirty five victims over a ten month reign of terror, which came to an end when Colonel John Henry Patterson killed both within a span of twenty days in December of 1898.There was something very oddly familiar in the movie to me, and I don't know how to explain it or what to chalk it up to. I keep a dream journal, and quite a few months ago, I had one in which a friend of mine and I were attacked by a tiger, and we sought refuge in a large wooden structure, pushing back against the large cat using a gate similar to what was shown in the movie. That scene in the movie is going to stay with me a while just because of the circumstances of that dream. I'd call it a nightmare except nothing terrible really happened, it just ended quite undramatically with the tiger running away. The other thing I thought about during that scene was how the old 'shooting fish in a barrel' concept didn't really work too well with those three hapless outlaws hired to kill the lion. Seriously, how could they miss as many times as they did?I'll tell you though, the scene that was really scary was the one showing the first victim Mahina (Henry Cele) being dragged out of camp by one of the man-eaters. Can you imagine what something like that would feel like, knowing that your end is coming soon and you can't do anything about it? That would be enough to cause one to die of fright. I would rank that scene right up there with some of the best horror flicks one could ever come across. It sends a chill even as I discuss it here.Regarding the rest of the movie, I don't know, it did seem to get bogged down in the latter half when Charles Remington (Michael Douglas) joined the hunt, and a lot of the filming had them lying in wait for something to happen with the Tsavo lions. One thought that occurred to me was the possibility that Dr. Hawthorne (Bernard Hill) might have sabotaged Patterson (Val Kilmer) by exchanging rifles with him, but nothing ever came of it, even though the weapon misfired or had no bullets. The only thing that came out of that scenario was Remington berating Patterson for giving up a weapon he was familiar with.

Nothing bad at all about this movie at all I actually found it's quite entertaining I praise Stephen Hopkins for directing this one of my favorite directors who also directed Nightmare on Elm Street 5 the dream child Predator 2 Blown Away I found the cinematography excellent the movies very well made and fine editing indeed what gets me mad is the fact that Val Kilmer supporting actor Razzie Award nomination when I thought he really did an excellent job in the movie even Michael Douglas even though appears halfway in the movie and the fact that it's based off a true story make this movie even more wonderful movies that are based off a true stories tend to end wonderfully which also makes this movie excellent indeed which should make it a cult classic.

Nothing beats the sheer adventurous spirit and eerie primal mythos that fuels Stephen Hopkin's The Ghost And The Darkness. It's a go-to comfort movie for me whenever I'm feeling down or stuck inside on a rainy night. It's like a campfire tale told on a quite windless night on the Serengeti, and like all the best scary stories, this one has roots in fact. In 1898, production of the East Africa Railroad along the Tsavo River was stalled for weeks, the workers suffering repeated attacks from two savage, mysterious lions. Acting against instinct, killing for sport rather than food and disappearing back into the night as quickly as they came, they were so ferocious and relentless that locals gave the eerie nicknames "the ghost and the darkness." The story has film written all over it, and Hopkins chooses the swashbuckling, Universal style horror route, and an irresistible tone. Val Kilmer, in his heyday, plays Patterson, an engineer sent by the boorish railroad tycoon Beaumont (Tom Wilkinson, chewing scenery like steak) to speed up production and pick up the slack in order to finish ahead of schedule. Not on the lions watch. He's scarcely arrived when they begins their endless tirade of horrific attacks, forcing him to trust in the skills of leathery game hunter Remington (Michael Douglas), sort of like Van Helsing crossed with Indiana Jones. The film clocks in under two hours but it seems longer somehow, like we're stuck with them in real time as the hopelessness of the situation sets into our bones, raising the stakes for our hunters and hammering home how terrifying an ordeal like this must be. Casting is on point here, watch for Bernard Hill as the sympathetic camp doctor, the late Om Puri and a brief early career cameo from Emily Mortimer as Patterson's wife. Occasionally straying into the realm of melodrama is this one's only fault, for the most part it's a hair raising, nightmarish account of adventure and terror told with style, packed with atmospheres and primed to get pulses racing.

Released in 1996 and directed by Stephen Hopkins from William Goldman's script, "The Ghost and the Darkness " is an African adventure based on the true events of two man-eating lions responsible for the deaths of scores of bridge construction workers on the Kenya-Uganda Railway from March through December 1898. The lions were dubbed The Ghost and The Darkness by the workers and thought perhaps to be demons. Val Kilmer plays real-life military engineer Lt. Colonel John Henry Patterson, who was commissioned to carry out the project. The addition of Michael Douglas as a charismatic great white hunter, Remington, is fictional, as Patterson pretty much hunted and killed the rogue lions on his own. Some claim that Douglas ruined the movie by using his clout to enlarge his part, but his character is only in the movie for 49 minutes as it is. Another deviation is that neither of the male lions had huge manes, as depicted; Tsavo lions possess either minimal manes or none at all. Interestingly, the two lions are on display at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. Patterson claimed that these big cats were responsible for up to 135 deaths; however, an official paper states that 'only' about 28–31 killings can be verified, but this figure does not take into account all those who were killed but not eaten by lions. I've always had mixed feelings about this movie, which can be witnessed in the fact that some people lambaste it (e.g. Roger Ebert's scathing review) while others laud it as a great or near-great adventure flick (the movie won an Academy award for Best Sound Effects). I'm in the middle. I think the actors and their characters are great. Kilmer curiously won a Razzie for his performance, which is inexplicable because he makes a great protagonist, taking the material serious with a low-key performance rather than a melodramatic one. Douglas takes the more megalomaniacal approach, but I'm pretty sure that's the way a lot of great white hunters were, cartoony though it may be. The locations, costuming and cinematography are also great, as are the lions and the creature F/X. The problem lies with the story, or the way it's told. The entire movie revolves around the lions attacking the personnel and the corresponding hunt to kill them. This is fine except that there's not enough human interest for a feature film of 110 minutes. A solid half hour could have easily been cut, making for a more compelling watch. Better yet, they should've given the characters greater dimension with more poignant dialogue and character-defining episodes, as was done in "Jaws" (1975), for example. I suppose it doesn't help that there are no primary female characters, although Emily Mortimer has a bit part as Patterson's wife.ADDITIONAL CAST: Tom Wilkinson plays the bastage financier of the project while John Kani and Om Puri appear as foremen. Bernard Hill plays the requisite doctor while Brian McCardie is on hand as a British supervisor. The movie was shot in Kenya and South Africa. GRADE: C+